Great progress has been made in the field of total hip arthroplasty (THA), commonly known as hip replacement. Hip replacements, particularly among the elderly, are now common. In spite of the considerable progress which has been made, many hip replacement operations still use relatively crude procedures. For example, it is common to make an incision of a relatively great length in a patient's hip as one of the first steps in a hip replacement operation. The incision may be as long as approximately eight inches (8″) to approximately twelve inches (12″). Large incisions may increase operating time and cause patients to lose large amounts of blood, suffer significant trauma to surrounding tissues, and require longer recovery periods.
Examples of minimally invasive hip procedures are disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 6,997,928, issued to Penenberg and titled “Apparatus for and Method of Providing a Hip Replacement,” U.S. Pat. No. 7,105,028, issued to Murphy and titled “Tissue Preserving and Minimally Invasive Hip Replacement Surgical Procedure,” U.S. Pat. No. 7,651,501, issued to Penenberg et al. and titled “Instrument for Use in Minimally Invasive Hip Surgery,” and U.S. Pat. No. 7,833,229, issued to Penenberg and titled “Apparatus for and Method of Providing a Hip Replacement,” each of which is incorporated by reference herein in its entirety. These patents also disclose numerous tools for use in performing the minimally invasive hip procedures. The devices, systems, and methods disclosed herein improve on the tools and methods disclosed in these patents.